Bell Policy Is Defended

UPI

Published: August 7, 1981

WASHINGTON, Aug. 6—
The Reagan Administration today defended its new policy against breaking up the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, saying international competition and national security were more important than antitrust considerations.

William Baxter, Assistant Attorney General, who failed to get a Federal judge to suspend the current A.T.&T. antitrust trial, told the Senate Judiciary Committee the Government's case could take up to seven years to decide.

After the hearing, Mr. Baxter said he had no plans to try again to ''put the case on ice,'' having already ''failed so spectacularly.'' But Commerce Secretary Malcolm Baldrige, another committee witness, made it clear that the Administration wants to end the court proceedings against the nation's largest company, saying it was necessary for the United States to remain world leaders in the telecommunications business. Speed, he said, was essential.

''We found an intense worldwide competition and a convergence of the telecommunications and the computer industry so that they will be more or less indistinguishable in the next 20 years,'' he said.

Mr. Baldrige said that the decision to try to stop the antitrust proceedings against A.T.&T. was confirmed in a White House meeting June 12 at which President Reagan was present.

The committee chairman, Senator Strom Thurmond, Republican of South Carolina, closely questioned Mr. Baldrige, asking why the White House had not consulted him or forewarned the Justice Department about the change in policy.